Paper towel and method of making the same



June 26, 1934. c. P. WINTER ET AL PAPER TOWEL AND METHOD OF MAKING THESAME Filed Oct. 7, 1933 INVENTORS Mal 7, w E, 17M 80 a. W M,

ATTORNEYS.

Patented June 26, 1934 PAPER TOWEL Aim THE METHOD OF MAKING SAMECourtney r. Winter and Dunbar A. Rosenthal, Chambersburg, Pa., assignorsto United States Paper Mills, Inc., Chambersburg,

Pa., a corporation of Pennsylvania Application October 7,

I 7 Claims.

. This invention relates to absorbent paper sheets or towels and moreparticularly to sheets of this character which are interfolded with eachother and adapted to be dispensed one at a time from a suitablecontainer.

The general object of the invention is to provide an improved articlewhich shall have greater absorbentproperties, which shall be more pleasant to the skin, which will not disintegrate so rapidly, and which canbe withdrawn from the container more easily and certainly and with lessdanger of tearing.

In preparing our improved towels, we employ a creping process by meansof which paper sheets of more or less crinkled character are produced.When a paper web in quite moist condition and adhering to the roll of apaper making machine is removed or scraped off by a doctor blade, thatside of the sheet which was adjacent the roll comes off relativelysmooth, except for a number of comparatively shallow almostimperceptible grooves, while on the opposite side of the sheet, thefibers are compacted into ridges of irregular height, rough in outline,and easily detected by touch. This rought side of the sheet is decidedlyharsh and unpleasant to the skin, while the other side is relativelysmooth to the touch.

Our improved towel comprises two such sheets arranged with theirrelatively rough surfaces innermost or in contact, and their relativelysmooth suriaces outermost. The smooth surfaces are thus presented to theskin of the user and readily absorb the moisture. The moisture does not,however, readily pass from one sheet to the other, owing to the factthat the capillarity between the sheets is broken up by the ridges onthe rough or inner surface thereof. Moreover, such a towel can be easilywithdrawn from a package or con-' tainer because the smooth surfaces ofthe'sheets are in contact with the walls of the container and with eachother, and this lessens the frictional resistance and permits withdrawalwithout danger of tearing, especially where the user's wet hand comes incontact with the towel.

In order that the invention may be readily understood, reference is hadto the accompanying drawing, forming part of this specification, and inwhich:

Fig. 1 is a diagrammatic view illustrating the method of making theimproved towels; and

Fig, 2 is a fragmentary transverse section on an enlarged scale, showinga fragment ofthe two assembled sheets forming a towel.

Referring to the drawing in detail, four separate webs a, b, c and darepreferably utilized in forming a package of the improved towels. Thesewebs pass around and adhere to'thesurfaces of four rolls 1, 2, 3 and 4,the webs being pressed into contact with the surface of such rolls '60by means of guide rollers 5. The web during this 1933, Serial No.692,666

period is quite wet, as compmed to usual pm tice.

Doctor blades 6 engage the rolls 1, 2, 3 and 4- at points remote fromthe guide rolls 5, and scrape or strip the damp webs therefrom and thedesired creped condition is thereby produced. These webs a, b, c and d,after leaving the doctor blades may be treated in any suitable manner asby drying, heat, pressure, trimming, embowing or imprinting (not shownbut indicated by a break in the web), eventually, but in dry condition,converging toward each other in the relative position as shown. For thepurposes of this present invention and in contrast to usual practice inmaking crepe paper, the crepe effect is produced on a. web which isquite moist, whereas it has been customary in usual creping processes toapply that treatment to a sheet from which water has largely beenremoved or which has been subjected to some sort of drying treatment.The optional desired treatments which may be given the webs afterleaving the rolls 1, 2, 3 and 4 and their respective doctor blades andbefore reaching the rolls 7 might require that the webs be collected inindividual rolls before being subjected to the succeeding steps of thepresent invention, but this is unimportant to the present invention andhence is not illustrated except diagrammatically by the breaks in thewebs between the rolls 1, 2, 3 and 4 and the rolls 7.

The drawing shows the essential steps in the treatment of the webs. Asindicated in Fig. 1, the surface of each of these webs which was incontact with the rolls 1, 2, 3 and 4 is relatively smooth while theopposite or outer surface is relatively rough and formed with irregularridges. It will further be seen that as the pair of webs a and b passbetween the rolls 7, the rough surfaces there- -of are innermost or inengagement with each other while the smooth surfaces are outermost. Thesame is true of the pair of webs c and d.

After leaving the rolls 7, each pair of assembled webs pass betweenperforating rolls, the webs a and b'passing between rolls 8 and 9 andthe assembled webs c and 11 passing between rolls 10 and 11.

Two of these rolls, namely, e rolls 9 and 10, have a longitudinallyextending groove 13 formed in their surface while the other two rolls,namely, the rolls 8 and 11, are provided with perforating blades 12which are adapted to enter these grooves.

It should be noted that the blade and groove on rolls 8 and 9 aredisposed 180 apart from the blade and groove on rolls 10 and 11 sothatthe lines of perforations in the two pairs of assembled webs do notregister with each other but are spaced apart lengthwise of thewebs a.distance equal to half the circumference of the rolls. The lines ofperforations on each assembled pair of dicated at :c, and

' gered relation webs are of course spaced apart a distance equal to thecircumference of said rolls. After leaving the perforating rolls 8, 9,10 and 11, the two pairs of .webs are brought together and are ledbetween another pair of rolls 14, which are driven at substantially thesame peripheral speed as the rolls 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11.

Leaving the rolls 14, the two assembled pairs of webs pass throughinterfolding mechanism comprising a pair of rolls 15 and 16. Thesetravel at a peripheral speed slightly faster than that of the precedingrolls, and thus exert a pull on that portion of the paper webs lyingbetween them and the rolls 14. This pull results in the webs being tornapart at each line of perforation, a two-ply section being tornalternately first from the assembled pair of webs a and b and then from.the assembled pair of webs c and d, as the two pair travel toward therolls 15, 16.

The rolls 15 and 16 and interfolding mechanism, of which they form apart, may be of any well known construction, such, for example, as thatillustrated in Patent No. 839,521, to J. H. Spoerl, dated December 25,1906. Each of these rolls is provided with a longitudinal groove 17 andat a diametrically opposite point with one or more rows of .pins 18. Therolls furthermore are cut away eccentrically as indicated in dottedlines, and as shown in said patent, to provide recesses in whichstripper fingers 19 mounted on rock shafts 20 are adapted to oscillate,such oscillation being produced by any suitable means (notshown).

As a result of the arrangement above described, it will be seen thateach pair of assembled webs is severed into sections or units having alength equal to the periphery of the perforating rolls 8, 9, 10 and 11,and that by reason of the stagof the lines of perforations in the twopairs of assembled webs, these sections are torn by the rolls 15 and 16first from one pair and then from the other alternately, and the unitsare interfolded and formed into a package by the stripper fingers 19. Itwill further be seen that each section or unit is foldedtransversely,.as inthat the free ends 11 of each of the two adjacentsections is enclosed within such fold. This method of interfolding,broadly speaking, is not new, being the same as that shown in the abovementioned patent to Spoerl. The present invention, however, differs fromSpoerl in that two assembled pairs of sheets are interfolded instead oftwo single sheets.

In Fig. 2 of the drawing is illustrated on an enlarged scale a fragmentof the two webs a and b, and it will be seen that the outer surfaces aand b' of these assembled webs or sheets is relatively smooth. The innerfaces of these webs or sheets, however, is relatively rough, havingthereon numerous irregular projections or ridges u and 0; respectively.When the rough sides of the sheets are placed face to face, inengagement, as shown, these ridges do not, of course, fit together, butrather more or;less abut and prevent close contact between the body ofthe sheets. Thus there are formed voids or air spaces 10 between thesheets and these serve to very matebreak up or reduce the capillaritybetween the sheets. ,For this reason, the passage of moisture from onesheet to the other is substantially retarded and rapid disintegration ofthe towel through weakening of the combined sheets due to excessivemoisture is prevented. Also only the smooth surfaces of the sheets comein contact with the skin of the user, and the unpleasant harshnesscharacteristic of many towels heretofore known is avoided. In additionto being more pleasant to use, the improved two-ply towel shown in Fig.2 has superior absorbent qualities due to the fact that the outersurfaces, being relatively smooth, present larger effective areas whichare capable of lying in fiat contact with the skin or other wet surface.

Furthermore, owing to the fact that both pairs of webs are assembledwith their smooth surfaces outermost, it will be seen by reference toFig. 1 that it is the smooth surfaces of the towel sections or unitswhich lie in contact with each other when assembled in a package. Forthis reason, the individual units readily slip apart when pulled,ofiering a relatively small frictional re-e y sistance, and may thus beeasily withdrawn without tearing. What we claim is: 1

1. A paper towel comprising a pair of co-extensive sheets each havingone face smoother than the other, the smoother surfaces of both sheetsbeing outermost.

2. A paper towel comprising a pair of sheets each having a relativelysmooth and a relatively rough face, the rough faces of the two sheetsengaging each other.

3. A paper. towel comprising a pair .of disconnected substantiallyco-extensive sheets each having one relatively rough face, said sheetsbeing held in assembled relation solely by the adhesion of said roughfaces.

4. Apaper towel comprising a pair of disconnected substantiallyco-extensive sheets, and means formed on and constituting an integralpart ,of the contacting surfaces of the sheets for breaking up thecapillarity between said sheets, whereby moisture is not readilytransmitted from one to the other.

5. The method of making two-ply paper towels which comprises laying apair of separate webs continuously on two creping rolls, removing thewebs from the rolls in such manner as to form each web with relativelyrough and smooth surfaces, bringing the webs together with theirrelatively rough surfaces in engagement, and severing the assembled pairof webs into sections.

6. The method of making two-ply paper towels which comprises preparingtwo separate webs of indefinite length, each web with relatively roughand smooth surfaces on its opposite sides, pressing the webs togetherwith their relatively rough surfaces in engagement, and severing theassembled pair of webs into sections.

'7. The method of making paper towelswhich comprises causing a web ofpaper to adhere to a revolving roll, scraping the paper from such .rollin such manner that one side becomes rela- COURTNEY P. DUNZBAR A.ROSENTHAL;

